Oracle--Solar Wind Page 23

  “Lye already did,” Coy informed him.

  “No…” Lionel gasped in disbelief. “Was anyone hurt? Pauline? Ana?”

  “Thankfully no,” said Coy.

  With a heavy sigh, Lionel continued, “Well, I may not have control over Lye, but I do have some control over the militaries of all 193 members of the UN. That’s why I’m down here in Antarctica. I just came from the Arctic, where there were reports of some unusual activity in Canada’s Northwestern Passages.” Coy and Thorne quickly glanced at each other, realizing their submarine voyage hadn’t gone unnoticed. “But since there’s no continent up in the Arctic Circle, I figured it might be smart of me to hang out down here at its southern counterpart, just in case—hence the military presence.”

  “We were wondering about that,” said Thorne.

  “Make no mistake about it,” Lionel carried on, “I am still a friend to Ret, still your collective ally. As you can see, I am paving the way for you and Ret, not obstructing it. Whatever you need—clearance into a country, some cover-up, extra cash—I’m here to help. Despite what you may have seen at the UN meeting, I remain your biggest supporter.” Then, as if he knew about the current discord that had arisen between Ret and Mr. Coy, Lionel concluded with a chuckle, “Surely you don’t take everything you see at face-value?”

  Lucky for Lionel, his lesson hit home with the two men sitting across from him. In some eerie way, the physicist-turned-politician always seemed to know more than he let on. Still, the man had crafted a compelling argument in defense of his actions before the UN. Maybe Mr. Coy was wrong about him.

  “So what brings you two all the way down here?” Lionel questioned.

  “Actually, we were following Ret,” said Coy, taking a sip of his hot cocoa.

  “Is he not with you?” Lionel replied.

  “No, he and the other kids left without us knowing,” Coy explained.

  “So where are they now?” Lionel wondered with a sudden surge of worry.

  “I suspect they’re already here somewhere,” Coy told him. “We may have found them by now had you not ordered us to land.”

  His anxiety growing, Lionel pressed, “They weren’t in a floatplane, were they?”

  “Yes,” Thorne answered suspiciously. “Why do you ask?”

  “Oh no,” Lionel mourned.

  “What?” Coy urged. “What is it?”

  “There was a floatplane that flew into our airspace just before you did,” Lionel said. “Whoever it was, they refused to identify themselves. We repeatedly tried to warn them, but they failed to cooperate.” Then, wincing, he said, “So we shot it down.”

  “You shot it down?!” the two men erupted.

  “It may not have been the kids,” Lionel tried to quiet them.

  “Who else would it have been?” Coy raged.

  “Let’s not jump to conclusions,” Lionel hushed.

  “Coming from the guy who went ahead and shot down a plane,” Thorne grumbled.

  “I was just about to go and search through the wreckage when your jet was spotted,” Lionel said. “Would you like to come with me?”

  “Of course,” Coy replied, as it was common sense.

  “Then I’ll ready the snowmobiles immediately,” Lionel promised on his way out of the room.

  Ever unsure about Lionel, Mr. Coy waited for him to exit the room before conferring the Oracle’s tracking device. With Thorne watching intently, Mr. Coy retrieved it from his pocket, the two fathers hoping to see a single dot that would tell them the youth were still alive.

  The screen was blank.

  CHAPTER 20

  SOLAR WIND

  Ret had to act fast. Dusty was up to his chest in the suffocating sand, the flames at Ana’s feet were creeping closer, and the shiny blade of the tall guillotine would strike Leo within seconds. There was no time for fear.

  Fortunately, all it took to end the pandemonium was a simple wave of Ret’s hand: the metal blade stopped just inches above Leo’s head; the fire died before it could melt the rubber of Ana’s shoes; and Dusty’s pit was turned inside-out, expelling sand into the air. What had initially seemed like an unbeatable dilemma had been won without much effort.

  It had been too easy. Ret marveled at the odds that each of the dangerous situations consisted of one of the three elements he had already mastered. That was when he realized the scenarios were actually tests and that big hairy white guy was probably a Guardian.

  Ret and Paige ran to help their friends.

  “That was a close one,” Ret told Leo as he approached the guillotine, which was up against the cavern’s slick, icy wall. As Ret drew closer, however, his perception of the scene changed. Leo was not stuck in the guillotine; in fact, Leo was nowhere to be seen. There was merely a reflection of him on the wall.

  Confused, Ret stopped and took a few steps back. From far away, it looked like Leo was kneeling down with his neck locked in the stock, but when Ret went up close, he could see the truth: it was only Leo’s reflection, an image of him projected on the wall.

  Ret glanced over at Paige, who was carefully trying to cross the hot coals on her way to untie Ana.

  “Paige,” Ret called out to her, “they’re not real.”

  “Tell that to my feet,” she returned.

  “No, I mean the people aren’t real,” Ret clarified.

  Paige immediately looked up at Ana. All she found was a two-dimensional version of her best friend, her reflection splashed onto the wide wooden stake that was leaning against the wall.

  Then both Ret and Paige turned to Dusty. The contents of the sandpit lay all around, but Dusty hadn’t changed. His image was bent at the waist, with half of him on the wall and the other half bent along the floor.

  Meanwhile, the white behemoth in the room had erupted in celebration, stomping out a sort of victory dance and throwing his arms in the air.

  “Finally!” he cheered with immense relief. “You don’t know how long I’ve been waiting for this day. You’re here—you’re actually here! The end of my assignment is at hand.” The man’s booming voice startled Paige, and she sought security at Ret’s side.

  “Is he Sasquatch?” Paige asked Ret under her breath.

  “I heard that,” the giant said, picking up the sound waves even from a distance. “Sasquatch, Bigfoot, Yeti—I’ve heard ‘em all. But you, my friends, may call me Rado,” he said, stopping in front of them with a slight bow, “Guardian of the Wind Element.”

  An obvious change had come over the Guardian. He was no longer mean and threatening but kind and welcoming. His cold shoulder had given way to a warm handshake. Gone was the monstrous snow beast, replaced by an affable stuffed animal. It seemed his imposing demeanor had been but a façade, super-imposed on the gentle giant within.

  “I’m sorry if I had you scared,” Rado said, “but it’s what I must do to keep the element safe these days. Every now and then, someone gets too close to this glacier, and I have to scare them off. That’s what I did to those three young people you left at ground level. Please give them my sincerest apologies.”

  “So they’re okay?” Ret asked. “You didn’t capture them or anything?”

  “Oh no,” Rado answered. “They simply ran off.”

  “Then how did you create their reflections?” Ret wondered.

  “It was easy,” said Rado. “Once I had a picture of them in my mind, I created an image of them using light. It’s like how an artist splashes paint on a canvas.” He lit up part of a nearby wall to demonstrate. “A little red here, some blue there, maybe some darker and softer hues of yellow—and there you have it.” Ret and Paige looked at images of themselves on the wall, which, though not their true reflections, sure seemed real. “If I want, I can even make them move.” Just then, the image of Ret kissed the image of Paige on the cheek. The real Paige squeaked with glee. “It’s a skill you will soon have, if you don’t already.”

  “So you trick people?” Paige questioned.

  “Not directly,” Rad
o explained. “Some people are easily deceived by what they see—real or not—especially when what they see is something they fear. But fear, like reflections, is not a real, tangible thing. It is a trick of the mind. So I don’t trick people—they trick themselves. But it didn’t work with you two. I sense very little fear in you. For most people, just seeing me is enough to scare them off—but not you. So then I moved on to the tests. Your First Father told me which elements would be collected before mine, so that stage over there,” he pointed to the three scenes, “had been set for a long time. But even when your friends appeared to be in danger, you did not let your fear cripple you. Well done.” Paige gave Ret a playful nudge as compliment.

  “It wasn’t always this way, you know,” Rado continued. “Before the elements were scattered and the supercontinent broke apart, this land was peopled and plentiful—the opposite of what it is today. But, over time, it drifted farther and farther south. Believe it or not, the snow here used to melt—all of it—but not so much anymore. As the conditions became increasingly harsh, the inhabitants were forced to flee, and pretty much all life died out.”

  “Except for the penguins,” Ret inserted, earning a laugh from Paige.

  “By the time I finally found the wind element,” Rado retold, “this glacier had already formed around it. Of course, it has nearly doubled in size since then but seems to have receded a bit in recent years. Must be all that global warming flimflam I hear about in the airwaves. I say bring on the heat! Let’s get this place back to how it used to be.”

  “How have you been able to survive the cold, sir?” Paige asked.

  “The element keeps each Guardian alive,” Ret whispered to her.

  “Yes, there’s that,” Rado agreed, “but this nice, thick coat of hair helps some, though I suppose it also has contributed to my worldwide fame.” Then, as if insulted, he said, “Bigfoot—how unimaginative. And Yeti—sounds like an Italian pasta. Sasquatch? I mean, how do people think of these names?”

  “How about Abominable Snowman?” Ret suggested.

  “I actually came up with that one,” Rado admitted. “I thought ‘abominable’ sounded pretty scary, and I hoped it would get people to start looking for an actual snowman. But I don’t care what the world calls me so long as they stay away. I’m constantly roaming this glacier, checking for anyone who might be snooping around. The advent of the internet has helped immensely in recent years: now whenever people see me, I can adjust their stories and change the locations of sightings—all from the comfort of my ice box. If someone snaps a photo of me, for example, I sift through the airwaves until I find it, then scramble the pixels or just scrap it entirely. Can you believe some people actually think I’m roaming the forests in Canada somewhere?” He laughed triumphantly, “They’re so confused. Isn’t the wind element wonderful…I’m sorry, what was your name?”

  “I’m Ret, and this is Paige.”

  “And do you also bear the scars, young lady?” Rado asked politely.

  “No, but I do have the Oracle,” she replied, wanting to contribute. She pulled it from her pocket to show the Guardian. Unexpectedly, Rado’s cheery temperament faded slightly when he saw the sphere.

  “Did you know there is a signal coming from the Oracle?” Rado pointed out.

  “There is?” Ret questioned.

  “I could see a signal coming from your pocket, Miss, and thought it might be your phone, but clearly it is not.” Rado extended his hand. “May I see the Oracle?” Paige looked at Ret, who nodded approvingly, before handing over the sphere.

  The Oracle looked like a golf ball in Rado’s massive paw. A gentle wind began to blow up from the palm of his hand, causing the Oracle to hover in the air. He brought his other hand alongside the sphere and shined an exceptionally bright light at it from the side. A large image of the Oracle was projected onto the wall. Rado slowly spun the Oracle around until they could see the tiny tracker, now many times magnified.

  “Are we being tracked?” Ret asked with concern.

  “I can’t tell,” Rado assessed. “It’s only sending a signal, not receiving one. Still, I’d feel better if it was destroyed.” Rado shut off the light and then blew a frigid wind at the Oracle, which glazed the sphere in ice. Then he called the wind back, unfreezing the Oracle. A tiny spark appeared on the sphere, and the signal went dead.

  “I can’t take any chances around here,” Rado put forth, handing the Oracle back to Paige, “especially with what happened yesterday.”

  “Sir?” Ret wanted to know.

  Said Rado, “Lye was here.”

  “He was?” Ret asked.

  “He snuck in while I was out roaming the area—made it all the way to the element, that clever little crook,” Rado detailed. “I watched him for a few minutes before I revealed myself. He had someone with him—a sidekick or helper, maybe even a robot. I don’t know what the thing is, but it was giving Lye an awfully hard time. Lye would drag it to the element, then release it to see what it would do, but it would just walk away like it wanted to find something else besides the element. Well, as soon as Lye saw me, he hightailed it out of here. Though he would never admit it, he’s always been afraid of me. (What did I tell you about fear?) He left behind his uncooperative assistant, which I seized, of course, but it refused to speak. I’m not sure the thing is even real. Actually, it kind of resembles you, Ret.”

  “Can I see it?” Ret requested.

  “By all means.” Rado led his guests into an adjoining room, a massive chamber in the heart of the glacier. From top to bottom, everything was made of the purest ice. The flat floor was an ice skater’s paradise, as slick and polished as glass. The high ceiling hung like a huge gemstone, the many faces of its crystal-clear ice obscuring a view of the sky but casting bits of sunbeams down below. The room was circular, with frozen walls that had been custom-carved at many different angles like in a house of mirrors.

  “How do you like the walls?” Rado asked with a hint of accomplishment as he led them deeper into the room. “Carved them myself, you know.”

  Off to the side, Ret could see the silhouette of a person standing in the shadows. Rado stopped in front of the statue-like being and then provided his own spotlight. Paige gasped at the sight.

  “It’s…it’s—me,” Ret said.

  “I thought it looked like you,” Rado stated. “Is this your evil twin or something?”

  “I have no idea what this is,” Ret said honestly. “I’ve never seen it before.” Then, sizing it up, he remarked, “Is my nose really that big?” Paige swatted him playfully. “You said Lye brought it here, Rado?”

  “As far as I know,” said the Guardian.

  “Maybe Lye cloned you, Ret,” Paige shared her thoughts. “That way he’d have his own set of scars.” The idea had merit.

  “Here, I’ll unfreeze it,” Rado volunteered. “Maybe you can get it to do something.”

  Like a ghost, a frosty air emerged from the clone. Ret and Paige braced themselves for the unknown, but as soon as the lookalike had thawed, it flopped to the floor.

  “Hmm, it’s never done that before,” said Rado. “Hope I didn’t kill it by keeping it frozen too long.” Then, with an embarrassed smile, he said, “Maybe it’s nocturnal.”

  Ret tried to see if he had some connection with the clone. He poked it with his foot, waved his hand at it, even tried to stand it up, but it remained totally unresponsive. He knelt down and examined the clone’s hands. There, indeed, were the scars, just like the ones on Ret’s hands.

  “Well, I don’t know,” Ret shrugged. Then, turning to Rado, he asked, “So where is the element?”

  “Right this way,” Rado escorted them, leaving the clone unfrozen on the ground.

  Trying not to slip on the smooth floor, Ret and Paige followed the Guardian, whose paw-like feet afforded him considerable traction. Rado stopped at the center of the room, where there was a hole in the floor. Though a familiar sight to Ret, he accompanied Paige up to the edge, where they gazed i
nto a vertical shaft that seemed to extend all the way to the earth’s core. Ret heard Paige gulp at the profound depth, and he eased her away.

  Ret was about to direct Paige’s attention to the wind element, which he knew from experience would be floating above the bottomless pit, but it wasn’t there. He looked all around, even at varying angles, but there was no element to be found.

  “Uh, Rado, sir,” Ret asked. “Where’s the element?”

  “It’s there,” the Guardian reassured him. “You just can’t see it yet.” Then, after scanning the darkening ceiling, he estimated, “Give it a few more minutes.”

  Eager to utilize this precious time with one of the Guardians, Ret said, “Sir, while I was with Argo—”

  “You’ve met Argo?” Rado roared with fondness. “Ah, that guy…how I miss the old crew. Which element did he get stewardship over?”

  “Fire,” Ret recalled.

  “Lucky dog,” Rado mumbled, glancing around at all the ice.

  Ret resumed, “Yeah, well, while I was with Argo, he told me how the First Father gave each of the six Guardians something to give to me, the one with the scars.”

  It jogged Rado’s memory: “Oh, that’s right—the relic.”

  “Is that what they’re called?” Ret asked.

  “That’s what your First Father called them,” Rado explained. “Hold on.” The Guardian held out his hand and, with the other, began fiddling with something that was wrapped around one of his plump fingers. It was hard to see amid all the shaggy white hair on his fingers. At first, Ret thought it was a ring, but then Rado started untying it. When finished, he presented a white handkerchief to Ret.